With all due respect - these are mass produced nylon flags. They are not rare and they're not made of anything that might degrade quickly. I'd unfurl them and enjoy them in your "space room" while keeping them out of the sun. You could also fly them outside when the Shuttle is flying - this is a great way to start conversations with space-minded neighbors.

spaced out

I always assumed these were mass produced items too but in the last few months these large Shuttle flags have been offered by a couple of sellers on eBay for big bucks ($60-100) and as far as I could see they've been selling well.

Those prices are not far short of some of the more common Shuttle flown 4x6" flag presentations.

Fezman92

Thanks Gary. I knew that they were mass produced and I did get it from eBay for a good price. I plan on flying my Endeavour one when STS-134 flies. I like the photo of your house.

Rocket Chris

...is there a store were these flags can be purchased? Beside eBay?

Fezman92

The company that makes them is called Annin & Co. I contacted them in the summer and they said that a standard one would cost around $190 or so.

Robert Pearlman

Until recently, NASA considered the orbiter flag designs to be restricted to official use, much like the agency's seal. Sale of the flags to anyone, in any size, was prohibited.

From what I understand, per NASA Headquarters, that policy remains in effect. Space shops and souvenir stores still cannot produce the flags for sale to the public.

So how is it that Annin & Co. flags are being listed and sold on eBay?

Within the past several months or so, what began as a small order at Kennedy Space Center spread to encompass two very large batch orders by NASA and contractor employees at all the centers and facilities. By very large, I mean thousands of flags, if not also thousands of sets of flags (each of the orbiters, excluding Enterprise but including Challenger, for which an original Spaceflight Awareness flag never existed).

Because of the size of these orders, the flags were available to employees at $20 each, or $100 for the set of five.

Some employees (presumably) ordered extras for friends and/or themselves and listed a few on eBay. The initial auctions were met with strong interest, driving the price up to about $200 a piece and subsequent listings followed suit.

(It sounds like Annin & Co. might be basing their own quote on what they have seen the flags sell for on the secondary market, but that's just a guess -- it may very well be that at a per flag rate, the retail price is that much higher.)

For what it is worth, when the second large NASA batch order was still on-going, several cS readers who are also space program employees offered to order flags on behalf of our readership. I tried to get NASA to sign off on that first -- the last thing I wanted to see happen was to start advertising the flags on this site and then as a result, have the agency decide to step in and not only block our own orders, but cancel the order for the employees, too. Unfortunately, a response never came.

I share all of this not so readers start accusing eBay sellers of marking up the flags -- the demand set the original price -- but rather to explain the flags' availability.

Fezman92

Thanks for the background Robert. If the seal is restricted for use then how come CRW Flags are able to get away with it? They also sell other agency seals.

Robert Pearlman

You would need to ask CRW Flags and/or NASA...

p51

Who made these originally? I have been seeing them on eBay and I have to wonder how many of them were made, as there are clearly several of each on eBay right now. None are less than 200 clams, though.

Seems odd to me, in that this would have been a great item to produce in mass and sell at the KSC gift shop. I know I'd have bought one, but not for 200 bucks. I'd easily pay that if I knew it was flown at the pad, but not for a newly-made flag that you have no way of knowing how many were made...

Robert Pearlman

Most, if not all, of your questions were addressed in my November 22, 2010 (1:37 p.m.) reply to this thread (see above).

OV-105

I got a desk set of four a few years back on eBay before the big flags started showing up. I wish they would do the Enterprise and Challenger flags on the desk size.

X-Plane Fan

A full size Enterprise flag was produced by NASA, only a few hundred were ordered. Highly unlikely they will do the desk size, but it would be cool.

Spaceguy5

I'm seeing quite a bit of price gouging for these. It seems sellers on eBay have the impression that these are worth no less than $100 despite a few $99 starting auctions getting no bids. There were a few I was considering buying until the seller raised the mininum from $20 to $99.

Hopefully this kind of activity doesn't discourage NASA from making similar items available in the future.

bthumble

I have seen small desk size flags like this for sale on eBay over the last couple of years, and would love to have a set of them in that size.

p51

quote:Originally posted by Spaceguy5:There were a few I was considering buying until the seller raised the mininum from $20 to $99.

Yeah, I saw the exact same listings, I was going try for one or two, then logged into eBay today and say they were raised to a hundred.

Remember when they were going for 200 bucks for a while? I've noticed that on eBay, people will just keep listing something over and over until they eventually get someone who doesn't care what it costs...

GACspaceguy

So is there any place beside eBay where these flags can be obtained?

Spaceguy5

These were available to Kennedy Space Center employees for $20 each. I'm not sure if they're still available nor if they were available to employees at other space centers.

Many of the ones on eBay are coming from KSC employees who bought up a bunch of them to resell after they lost their jobs. Though of course, they made sure to jack up the price by a factor of 5 to 15.

Robert Pearlman

If I recall correctly, the first flags that were listed on eBay were offered for near or at the $20 that was paid, but collectors quickly bid them up to over $200 each. The $20 was well below retail, based on the quantity of flags that were ordered in bulk.

Amazon lists large U.S. historical flags for $90 retail, marked down from $125.

I guess the price has to do with how much you want something. We have finished picking up the last of our flags to complete the set.

We picked up one from a KSC employee at cost, one at an auction ($150 after premium and shipping) and the rest on eBay for around $100 each. We are okay with all the price points as it is what we needed to complete the set.

I would be upset if it would turn out that there was a website somewhere that sold them for $20 and we paid that much more, but it appears that is not the case.

Here is our final display that we put in our bonus room which has vaulted ceilings.

garymilgrom

Beautiful display Fred and Jackie!

Spaceguy5

Most NylGlo 4x6 feet flags I've seen were about $50 to $60 retail.

Plus I've even seen a US flag which was flown at the Kennedy Space Center during a launch sell for $173, and several small space-flown flags sell for around $115. I could understand these orbiter flags being around $100 many years from now, but they're brand new, made in fairly big runs, and were available to employees for only $20.

Hopefully the prices creep down once the big-spender collectors get their flags (and the sellers realize they aren't going to get $100 for all of them). Many times, a high auction hammer price will only be representative of a few people with disposable incomes. For example, I've seen items worth maybe $5 sell for close to $100 on ebay as a result of badly-configured bid-sniping bots competing with each other.

I very much like the indoor display. Right now I'm temporarily living in an apartment, so the 3 flags I've picked up will have to stay in storage for a while.